Ghost Master is one of those rare titles that seems to move from one platform to another with distinctive ease. Even though it was developed for both the Xbox and PS2 simultaneously, it doesn’t have any of the lingering control difficulties that usually follow that decision. It’s a fantastic game especially if you are into strategy puzzlers. Even if you’re not, it’s still a terribly addictive venture that’s easy to pick up and you’ll find yourself haunting with the best of them in no time flat.

In all honesty, however, it was very hard to find any serious drawbacks to the game. I guess you could say that haunting is somewhat of a specific pastime that might not appeal to every player out there. But, even if paranormal goings-on and various ghostly activities don't tickle your fancy, you should at least have some fun with the all of the aforementioned aspects of gameplay.

Here’s a game that’s successfully innovative without losing you at the gate. Taking notes from the classic Bullfrog simulations of yesteryear, Ghost Master puts you in a diabolical gang of ghouls and ghosts commissioned to scare the collective pants off a small-town community. Along the way, lighthearted humor and creative story elements are unveiled at every turn, pushing this simulation to the head of its genre.

About the only thing missing from Ghost Master is a multiplayer mode, although it's hard to imagine how Sick Puppies could have incorporated such an option into a puzzle-oriented title like this. And the game isn't exactly any poorer for the omission of multiplayer features, since the numerous missions and impressive replay value will keep it on your hard drive for quite some time.

Ghost Master is probably the world’s first real-time influence puzzle strategy game. It is the best Peter Molyneux title since Magic Carpet, but it has no Peter Molyneux in the credits. Will Wright probably had something to do with the game too, perhaps through a medium or maybe he just moonlighted under a different name to work on a small, non-Maxis project. Ghost Master is painted with the style of the designers. With a pedigree like that, who couldn’t like it?

Having ghostly and ghastly apparitions cast as characters in games is nothing new. Usually though, the focus is on playing as the ghost buster, not the ghost. But developer Sick Puppies throws that convention out the haunted mansion window. Mixing up a little bit of the television series “Dead Like Me,” a lot of The Sims, and some “Beetlejuice” for humorous measure in its creative cauldron, Sick Puppies has come up with an original and fun strategy title, Ghost Master.

Other than this, the only somewhat serious defect to Ghost Master is the lack of in-mission saves. The game automatically saves when you complete a mission and when you upgrade your ghosts in the Ghoul Room. If you're struggling through an especially difficult mission and need to stop the game because of real-life concerns, you're stuck with restarting it from the beginning. When will developers realize gamers have lives that interfere with gaming and quit forcing us to replay sections of games for no other reason than we had to go to bed? Despite this one flaw, it's hard to put Ghost Master down once you start playing it. You'll even be willing to endure the frustration of restarting the mission just because you want to try another ghost and see if it works better. And you'll probably find yourself redoing a completed mission so you can try to free that one fettered ghost you left behind. Besides, how many other games give you the option to create a human torch?

Despite the original concept and ingenious execution, I found the game a bit repetitive and even predictable after awhile. Once you master the learning curve and are able to manipulate and organize your team of ghosts effectively Ghost Master becomes more of a chore or at best an exercise in puzzle solving.

When they presented Ghost Master, they told that it was a completely new concept. I’ve taken the job to review it on me, because I want to try everything. And surely everyone wants to be a ghost once. Let the horror commence.

Ghost Master is, unfortunately, better in concept than in execution and more fun to watch than to play, But for anyone with a perverse streak and a taste for well-curdled blood, it still makes for a good way to pass a dark and stormy night.

For all its ambition and the obvious effort put into creating a fun and somewhat original title, Ghost Master doesn't have a lot of life in it past the initial novelty of scaring the crap out of people. There's no multiplayer mode to speak of, and the 14 missions available really aren't going to keep you occupied for long. The ability to hop back and forth collecting extra ghosts, and scoring high in order to buy your troops extra skills is novel for a while, but the occasional tedium of the main game will mean that you won't be kept occupied for long. Then again, with any luck we're going to see a lot of extra content for Ghost Master in the future to extend the life of what is clearly quite a hopeful little title, and with some extra levels and more imaginative tasks to put our hands to we probably won't have to give up on it just yet.

In the end, Ghost Master is not supposed to be a glorified fish tank, however amusingly morbid; it promises satisfying game play and real strategic challenge. Unfortunately, these are promises it simply can't keep. Despite its strong personality and impressive presentation, Ghost Master isn't so formidible with the lights turned on.

If you like Real Time Strategy games that require your ability to deal with these type of details, then Ghost Master is the perfect game for you. But if, like me, you want a no frills attached straight to the action approach, you might find Ghost Master boring after a few hours. Scaring the bejeebers out of unsuspecting people is fun for a while, but soon becomes numbingly repetitive. Having played numerous RPGs that have gazillions of character details, I still think Ghost Master is bit too cumbersome and this negates what should have been the most important part of the game – the fun factor. Ghost Master is a great concept whose implementation falls short.